Hope is the wildest, most beautiful thing - A Reylo Story
by CarrieInAeterna
Summary: POST-TROS, ALTERS CANON. Rey Palpatine and Ben Solo grew up fighting the demons of abandonment and the pressure of expectations. As they escape Exegol together after defeating Rey's grandfather, they are suddenly faced with the reality of their deep, pure, and carnal feelings for each other - as well as their inexperience with love and communication. Where will they go from here?


**I. Lonely Rey**

As she scratched another tally mark on the metal wall of her room, she suddenly thought of how all-consuming her wait for her family had been. The phrase "arrested development" flashed through her mind as she untwisted her buns and let her chestnut hair hang loose and rest gently on her shoulders. She lived a hard life as a scavenger - the poverty was perpetual and inescapable, and she truly lived day to day with no real plan for the future. Her only real "plan" was getting her life on some sort of track after her parents returned, which was less of a plan and more of a wish at this point. She was nineteen years old - at least, that's what she estimated, she had know way of knowing for _absolute certain_ \- and from her few acquaintances and her observations she knew that nineteen-year-olds didn't really have the same loyalty to their families or base all their decisions around an obsession with their families' potential moves. _But_, Rey thought to herself, _they all knew their families. They grew up with parents, they grew up knowing themselves. I've never had that. _Even the Happabore pups she saw down by the trading post, drinking from the water troughs with their parents, had more family ties than she did. _That's just damn sad. _

So with these thoughts swirling in her head she would set her hair in childish buns every day, as if that would help her parents recognize her upon their return. She was not a child anymore in so many ways - she could defend herself, she lived alone, and she fed and clothed herself - but emotionally she was stagnant. She had no intimate relationships in her life, and she recognized that that was abnormal, but she had no real desire to change it. She wanted, _needed_, to find her parents, sure; but even that desire was not really tied up in some search for intimacy, whether it be emotional or physical. She needed them to solidify her identity, to finally admit to herself that she deserved to take up space in this world, _real _space, because she had a name. And people with names belong to someone and they deserve to exist.

Sometimes she thought about what life would be like if she gave up on waiting and _did something_ with her life. But what was that something would she do? She was a pretty good scavenger. I mean, with fourteen years' experience at anything, it would be _sad_ to not be at least decent. She had gained a reputation as someone who wasn't afraid of anyone or anything, sure - but a large part of that was because she didn't care about what any of them thought of her. It was all about survival. If someone threatened her right to survive, she spoke out. She fought. But love? Connection? Intimacy? Those were entirely different things.

Sometimes when she let her hair down before she slept she imagined that hair cascading around the face of a handsome stranger who loved her - however brief or long a time he loved her didn't really matter to Rey. _Or so she thought. _The most consistent element in her life was abandonment, but any other form of abandonment would never really cut as deeply as being abandoned by her parents. She had known that familial love, but she had never known a love like that - a _sexual_ love, an _animal_ love, a _carnal _love - so she made plenty of assumptions about how she might handle such a thing if the time ever came.

As she drifted off to sleep, she sent out a wish to the galaxy - that somewhere, wherever her parents were, they might hear her thoughts and come flying back to her. Then she put that thought aside (_far _aside), relaxed her muscles, and imagined the silhouette of that handsome stranger who would love her first, whomever he might be. Her fingers worked deftly, with intimate knowledge of this dance, and her body bucked with pleasure. She sighed as her tense muscles seemed to melt, from her shoulders to her abdomen to her calves, and a soft sleep overcame her. _Someday I'll know who I am. Someday I'll belong to somebody. Someday I'll figure out if anybody really is born to be a scavenger, or if I just got lucky that way. _She could never quite shake the feeling - and that's exactly what it was, _a feeling_ \- that she was not alone.

**II. Lonely Ben**

Sometimes he could still hear his mother's husky, lilting voice as he fell asleep, and that voice would ask him questions _Ben, is this who you really are? Come home. Please come home_. She had a deep voice for a woman, and he had always liked that. Not that he would have ever questioned it on the basis of sex, because he grew up surrounded by some of the strongest, bravest women in the galaxy, but his mother's deep voice spoke to him of a wisdom and authority that far outstripped that of any man he had ever known. This included his father. Honestly, as a child he had harbored a very secret, very repressed resentment towards his father because he never quite understood _how_ Han Solo the Smuggler ever ended up with Princess-turned-General Leia Organa. He never faulted his mother for choosing his father - he idolized her so much that the choice seemed that one-sided - but he sure did fault his father for not being good enough for his mother. He knew that without the two of them he wouldn't exist. He resented that, too.

Ben Solo had two needs that drove him: his desire to be powerful and his desire to be consistent. One of these needs came from his mother's strength and the other stemmed from his father's weakness. Leia was not only powerful but unflappable and only a fool underestimated that, and not many people acted that foolishly in her presence. They lauded and respected her for her strength and wisdom. Ben wanted that more than anything. Han, on the other hand, could not help the inconsistency and that constantly undermined him. He was more or less a good person who had managed to hit upon multiple laudable courses of action by some instinct or dumb luck, but he never really committed to them completely. He always had an out, and someone could always question his commitment and more than likely be right. Ben despised all of that, but he knew that his father's unreliable tendencies had been passed to him, too. Nothing was more humiliating for him than when, in his moments of weakness and insecurity, people pointed that out to him.

When Ben had begun his training with his uncle Luke, before the idea of _Kylo Ren_ was even a twinkle in his mind's eye, he wanted to be a Jedi like his mother. He had never seen her falter or struggle, and he knew that his uncle had helped train his mother - so he figured that under Luke's tutelage, he could kill the Solo in him and let the Skywalker take over. He underestimated how deeply indecision, doubt, and struggle found a home in his blood… and he never let his inner conflict, the call of the darkness, ever run loose. He harbored it away in his deepest, darkest thoughts and rarely entertained it. The call was strong, of course - it had to be. For the son of Leia Organa (and Han Solo) to turn? For Luke Skywalker's nephew to turn? When he was already so committed to being the sort of Jedi _that his mother was_? Yeah, the call had to be strong. Ben knew this. That is why he only peeked at these thoughts under cover of darkness, when not even he would put forth the effort to judge what he was doing.

But Luke… Luke was so strong in the Force, he had found Ben hiding in those secret, dark places. Then, when he had lashed out... however temporarily… Ben still remembered the fierce, almost wild, look in his uncle's usually calm green eyes. Luke had called it a momentary lapse in judgment, but Ben knew it was an act of truth. He remembered the shame that washed over him like a powerful ocean wave, a shame so deep it utterly consumed him in that moment. _If Luke really believed in me, he wouldn't have reacted that way. _Ben remembered this thought, too, one that was so painful that he had to screw up the courage to think it to himself in isolation. Once he became comfortable with it he had nursed it and let it grow strong until it swallowed him whole. _Fine. I'll be consistent, _he had decided. _I'll be powerful, too. I can have both those things. It was never just a choice between emulating my mother and my father and my uncle… someone else in our family had those characteristics, too. Maybe I'm most like him… _And that is when Ben Solo's fascination with Darth Vader began. And like Anakin Skywalker had done, Ben shed his name and became Kylo Ren.

He had broken Leia's heart. He had broken Han's heart, too. His fall from grace ripped them apart like it had torn him to shreds from the inside, and in some perverse way he enjoyed the rift he had caused in his family. A thrill coursed through his body when he realized just how deeply his parents loved him - so deeply that their stubborn natures and their love for each other couldn't keep them together once he had been lost. It was strangely satisfying to know that, but it left him uneasy as well. His pursuit of power and darkness satisfied something in him, to be sure. But he still felt conflict. He still felt pulled back. He was Leia Organa's good and powerful son, and Han Solo's good and inconsistent son. He could not remain in darkness when the pull towards the light was so strong. It was only a matter of time before another trusted and idolized mentor recognized that weakness in him. So, he did the only thing that he could do to further suppress his true desires - he _threw himself _into his evil, and forced himself to be consistent. _Eventually there's a point of no return, right? There has to be. _

But sometimes… sometimes Ben longed for understanding. It felt lonely in his head, and his thoughts scared him when they were undoubtedly good and scared him when they seemed irreparably evil. _Does anyone know what this is like?_ He wondered, lying awake at night and listening to the ghost of his mother's voice. _To struggle with identity like this… could someone ever understand? _Really _understand? If they could, I'm strong enough, I'd feel it. I'd trust them with everything, maybe. Does that exist?_

As he drifted off to sleep, he sent out a wish to the galaxy - that somewhere, wherever that person who might understand him could be, they might hear his thoughts and find some way to infiltrate his mind before he pushed them away out of instinct. Then he put that thought aside (_far _aside), relaxed his muscles, and imagined his mother singing him a lullaby. He sighed as his tense muscles seemed to melt, from his face to his arms to his feet, and a peaceful sleep overcame anyone had been able to penetrate his mind and find that out, he'd have killed them. _Someday I'll know who I am. Someday I'll reconcile this conflict in me before anyone realizes it exists. Someday I'll figure out if anyone can have a journey like mine, or if I just got lucky that way. _He could never quite shake the feeling - and that's exactly what it was, _a feeling_ \- that he was not alone.

**III. Escaping Exegol**

Sometimes it was still strange for Rey to think about the reality of being wrapped up in Ben's arms, about how he was the figure she had imagined in those years of isolation, loneliness, and starvation. How it was the thought of him loving her, knowing her, touching her, that relaxed her body enough to allow her to sleep peacefully despite her constant painful exhaustion. She had never known it was him in those early moments, of course; but the second she laid eyes on him, on the _real _him, on his beautiful face, she had known. She had recognized him...

When she had kissed him on Exegol, she felt something rise up in her that she had only felt hints of before. She was very familiar with the pleasurably painful throbbing in her core that used to catch her off-guard when she'd find herself thinking of him a little too intimately… when she felt braver she'd imagine his hands, his mouth, his eye level all lowered … much, much lowered… but then she'd catch herself, cast the thoughts away, blush when she realized, _Maybe he saw that. Maybe he knows. What the hell is going on?! What's wrong with me?! I need to be more guarded and less reckless with my thoughts… especially THOSE thoughts. _Sometimes she didn't know if she knew there was good in Kylo Ren because of the _Force_, or because of the effect that the imagined _force_ of his body on hers had on her. On Exegol, she finally knew it was both. Somehow she had always seen through the mask, and her body and mind had both drawn her to Ben Solo. And as luck or fate would have it, he was everything. Her gamble paid off. It was a perfect kiss, but it was more than that.

She couldn't believe she had saved him twice. _I'm going to remind him of that often,_ she thought to herself, smiling. Then she realized that that thought implied a future. A future of intimate teasing. _Nobody teases Kylo Ren,_ she realized. _But I think Ben… Ben Solo would probably like that. I'm sure he's sarcastic with the people he loves… but am I…?_

It was honestly a miracle that they had both survived. It should not have been possible for them both to live, and Rey didn't know who to ask to explain it. _Maybe dyads have a different bond,_ she reasoned. _Maybe there is no precedent. Maybe we'll have to figure it out ourselves because this hasn't happened in living memory. _After she had kissed Ben and he had smiled at her, everything around them began to crumble. He had untangled himself from her arms and stood at his full height, looking down at her with the softest brown eyes she had ever seen. His clothes were tattered, his hair was matted, and it seemed that dried blood covered all the visible parts of his body that weren't already covered by fresh blood. As she looked up at him, he held out his hand to her. _I wanted to take your hand. Ben's hand. _Her own words came flooding back to her and she reached out to him, and he gripped her hand and pulled her up to her feet. At the touch of his hand, that _feeling_ came back to her, deep in her gut. That carnal longing. As she stood, her legs began to shake with exhaustion and she held onto him tighter, pressing her body tightly against his side. He looked down at her, concerned. _God, he's so tall, _she thought to herself. She imagined Han Solo as she had known him and then made a mental image of him as younger, taller, stronger… yeah, he must have looked a lot like Ben. But not the eyes. Those soul-searching eyes were pure Leia.

"Rey."

He spoke, his rich voice shaking with … what was that exactly? Desire? Relief? Concern? Perhaps some combination of the three?

_That's the first time he's said my name. Him. Ben. That was the first time Ben has said my name._

"Mmm," Rey looked up at him, sighing, her legs still trembling. She could feel her face turning red.

"Rey… we should go." _Did that sound... gravelly? _"I've got a feeling that this place, uh, isn't going to be standing much longer...and it would be a shame to die after all of this." He looked at her and she could see a twinkle in his eyes. She felt one of his arms tighten around her shoulders and his fingers press into her skin. She winced as he brushed against a bruise. His healing life force may have returned her life, but it did not heal her cuts and scrapes. He felt her wince and looked at her, concerned. "Does it hurt?"

Rey nodded, avoiding eye contact with him. They were so brown they were almost black, and sometimes the intensity of his gaze was still too much for her to look on directly without becoming embarrassed. _I think he knows I've never felt this way before… and I hope he knows that I can't really walk out of here._

Ben looked at her thoughtfully for a brief moment, raising an eyebrow as he considered her battered body. He noticed that she averted her eyes when he looked at her, but he also knew her thoughts better than anyone. She was shy, but she wanted him. She was also badly hurt. She was far more hurt than he was; of the pair of them, she had borne the brunt of the attacks from her grandfather. In another fleeting glance the next second, he saw rocks begin to tumble. The foundations of this temple would not last long. In a few minutes, they would be buried. They needed to move.

"Rey," he breathed, his voice still husky and tired. "You're hurt. Really badly. Here…" He shifted her slightly, then hoisted her into his arms. "I'm not hurt as badly as you. I'll carry you back to your ship. We won't move quickly enough if you try to walk." As he spoke and lifted her up, so effortlessly and gently (like he had been doing it all his life), Rey could feel that simultaneously familiar and strange heat in her core begin to quicken and rage.

She wrapped her arms around his neck and buried her face in his chin as he began to walk, then run. He ran swiftly and with intention, but was careful not to jostle her too much. He made agile, catlike steps around the sharp stones and cracks beneath his feet. _This is such a far cry from the way we used to fight… from the way we used to hurt each other… but that wasn't him. This is Ben. Ben and Kylo Ren… they're not the same._ The rocks were falling at a steadier pace now, and she noticed him constantly stealing glances to ensure there was nothing falling that would crush or trap them. As she nestled into him, she sighed. His two-day-old stubble felt scratchy against her cheek and she loved it. His steady breaths, the warmth of his body, and the assuredness of her steps lulled her into a secure peace… _God, I could fall asleep in his arms right now. _She felt herself falling, falling, falling…

Suddenly a large pillar began to fall directly over them. Ben's eyes snapped up immediately and he gripped Rey tighter with one arm and lifted the other into the air, fingers spread out, brows furrowed, the power of the Force flowing out of him. He trembled and stumbled a bit, but he managed to throw the pillar aside and save them from being crushed. Rey sucked in a nervous breath and he felt it. He squeezed her tighter and she felt that _thrill _again.

He didn't have to ask her where she had left his uncle's X-wing. He knew, and she knew he knew. It was right on the edge of the planet's surface, and honestly it was a small mercy that it hadn't been crushed or otherwise damaged. He picked up the pace here, and his heart began to race. Rey felt it, but she also _felt _it. And it wasn't just because he was running faster in one final push to the X-wing, which was still standing, waiting for them.

_Oh. He's thinking about how an X-wing is a ship made for a single person… _her thought trailed off and she blushed before she could continue it, knowing Ben would likely sense that she was sensing what he sensed. Their connection was very confusing sometimes but she knew exactly what they would have to do once they got to that ship. _Luckily we're both excellent pilots, _she smirked.

They made it to the X-wing and Ben leaned forward on his toes to place her gently in the pilot's seat. He then climbed in after her and scooped her up into his arms again, cradling her in his lap as he took control of the ship. The environment was certainly cramped. When Rey was pressed up against him like this she could feel every part of him, and even without her Ben was a bit on the big side for an X-wing as it was. _I hope he's not uncomfortable with me here on top of him, _she wondered, her private thoughts not as confident as they had previously been.

As they took off, Rey noticed that an exhausted Ben didn't bother to fly the X-wing manually. He knew they needed to get out of Exegol as quickly as possible, and he knew that he didn't have the time or energy to try to decide where they should go next. He plugged in the automatic setting for the last destination. _What was that? Oh. Wait. Ahch To. We're going to Ahch To. I wonder if he knows that…_

As the X-wing took off from Exegol and soared through the stars, its course set, Ben let himself breathe and relaxed his tense muscles. He slowly removed one arm from Rey's side and ran one strong, calloused hand through his damp black hair. It was caked with sweat and blood and as he removed his fingers from his hair he noticed they were spotted with red. Embarrassed, he brought his hand down slowly again, hoping Rey hadn't noticed. She had.

_My sweet Ben. You worked so hard to get us out of there, and you didn't even think about how you were hurt, too. _That thrill pulsed through her body again at the thought of his selflessness, and had she been alone she might have involuntarily moaned. In a flash of inspiration, Rey grasped Ben's spotted bloody hand and lifted it to her lips. At first she looked straight ahead, refusing to look at him, embarrassed at her own impulsive act of intimacy. She could feel Ben stiffen under her touch, _all of him_, and that scared her too.

Ben leaned down and pushed her chin up to him so that he could look her in the eyes. As the stars outside their ship flew by, the stars in his eyes clearly fixated on only one subject. They locked eyes as her lips pressed one spot of blood, then another, then another. She bit down softly on his thumb web and he tried to shift his body underneath her at that touch but did not do a good job of it thanks to the cramped quarters. All he managed to do was confirm to Rey that he was somehow simultaneously stressed and relaxed under her simplest touch, desperate to struggle freely underneath the full weight of her body. _God, I have a lot of power. _She couldn't smile because he was still looking her in the eyes and her embarrassment and disbelief at what was happening overwhelmed her.

_We need to get to Ahch To soon. This suspense is killing me._

"Rey," Ben breathed, still looking at her. "You… you can sleep, if you want to. You know I won't hurt you and with the way you fought back there…" he gulped, clearly nervous. _I've never seen him like this before. _"You deserve the rest. Not that you wouldn't deserve it otherwise, of course… but I just know… oh, forget about it." He finished his sentence in frustration, breaking eye contact with her, gripping the X-wing controls to try and recover from his trouble with words even though they were useless on the current autopilot setting. Rey smiled softly to herself and reached for his hand, covering it with hers.

"Thank you, dear Ben," she croaked out softly, her throat dry and unused to speaking. "You're perfect." She grasped his hand, broke his grip on the controls, and kissed his hand again. "Thank you. I think I _will_ sleep… so long as you're comfortable."

Ben laughed a little at this, and she could sense that a stirring similar to what happened in her core when her body sensed their fleeting intimacy was happening in his in that moment. _When was the last time someone spoke to him like this? _She wondered. A horrifying thought occurred to her that perhaps the answer was never. Ben chuckled again and said in his dark, sarcastic, so _typically Ben _way, "No, scavenger, I'm not comfortable." She looked at him and feigned an incredulous gasp, light brown eyes wide with her fake shock. He grinned at that. "But I suppose I'll make that sacrifice so that you get enough rest for me to show you just what it is I think of you later." With that, he pressed a kiss to her temple and looked straight ahead again.

When Ben said those words, Rey felt something different. It was different from the confident version of herself she had seen with him in her mind for years before she met him, and a new shyness overtook her. She knew what he meant, but she also _knew_ what he _meant. _As she nestled back into his chest, she both knew what was next for them and wondered what was next for them. _A scavenger girl can become a Jedi, discover she is heiress to the most powerful Sith lord who ever existed, and destroy him, _she thought, _but can she let herself love and be loved?_

This was the thought that kept replaying in her mind as she drifted off to sleep in Ben's arms.

**IV. Shadows on Ahch To**

Although Ben related to his Skywalker side so much more than his Solo side in practically everything, he was still _Ben Solo_, and Ben Solo was the only son of Han Solo. Han Solo was not a perfect man and he certainly was not good at everything. The things he was good at, though, he was _really _good at. He was an excellent pilot, a loyal friend, a talented smuggler, and a _legendary_ lover. So basically, he was the scoundrel that Leia had accused him of being way before Ben was born. She had liked that, though. And it had taken some time, and his father had certainly stepped up his game and polished up his ambiguous morals, but eventually she'd admitted she liked it, too. And despite Ben's personal problems with his father and his incredulity that his mother had remained with him as long as she did, he secretly admired their love story and had always aspired to something similar. He had never let anyone know that, though. _That _particular secret he'd kept locked away very, very deep within himself. It was buried so deeply that he would be surprised if Rey ever stumbled upon it without his explicit knowledge or permission.

When Ben was younger, before he left to train with Luke in his mid-teens, his father passed on to him whatever of that niche expertise that he could. He had taught a very young Ben how to woo a woman and to bring flowers home to his mother whether she was happy or sad, in rain or shine. _This is a little way we show respect for her for all she does for us, _he had said. _Your mother is strong and beautiful enough. Sure, she doesn't _need _any of it. But if you love her, you show her. _Ben had never forgotten that: if you love her, you show her.

When Ben had gotten older, his parents had had the sex talk with him: they taught him consent, explained the technicalities and the intricacies, described what sex would be like with different species as well as different human genders, and encouraged open conversation about orientation and practical matters as well as any questions he might have had. Leia was particularly sensitive to the possibility that Ben might not be his father's son, but Han acted like he was sure of it. When he had alone time with Ben, he would drop tidbits he had learned over the years. These conversations between the two Solo boys were always private, and Han had never said _don't tell your mother_; he was sure that Leia knew, and quite frankly he did not care whether or not she approved. Ben was his son, too, and he wanted to teach him everything _he_ knew about being a man. So it was Han Solo who taught Ben the practicalities of pleasing a lady: where to touch, what to use, when to ask questions, and what signs to look for. _She needs to say yes, _Han had told him. _Why would you want to touch her if she doesn't want it or like it? You don't need to love her, but you need to respect her. _Sometimes Ben wondered whether or not his father had always lived by these words. Teenage Ben had friends who certainly had not been brought up this way, and would brag about what they could get girls to do with them. These boys didn't strike him as much different from who he imagined his father had been when he was younger. Ultimately, it did not matter if Han Solo was a hypocrite or a slow learner; Ben never forgot his lessons. He also never forgot his dream to maybe someday find a strong and powerful woman like his mother who would stay by his side the way Leia stood by Han.

Ben had lost his virginity when he was fifteen. He had been on Coruscant with his parents while his mother took care of work responsibilities. She had brought Ben along because he was going to leave for Ahch To to train with Luke soon, and she wanted to spend some time with him before training consumed his whole life. Han had accompanied his son to a cantina while Leia met with old allies, and Ben had met a beautiful girl there. Her ebony skin glowed radiantly. She met his gaze with black eyes that shimmered from the gold dust around them. Her waist-length brown hair gathered around her hips in a pleasing wave, and her smile dripped with the doubly seductive honey of experience and welcoming of a girl who was slightly older. Teenage Ben's jaw dropped. He had never felt himself so stirred. Han had noticed and gave his son a look, and Ben felt his mouth go dry with anxiety and curiosity. He'd approached the girl, they had talked, and eventually he'd followed her to another room, a bedroom of sorts, covered in expensive rugs and plush tasseled cushions. It was very private. His first time had not been legendary on his part - she had led, and she'd been gentle. The girl, Adamma, was not the love of his life. He knew this right away. At the time he hadn't thought of her as a notch on his bedpost, although that is what she would become in his memory. The memory of being with her was a good one, though.

When Ben emerged from the room, his pale cheeks flushed and his dark hair disheveled, he called on his father to come get him. Han had sensed what was going to happen, Ben knew it, and he had left to give his son some privacy. When Han arrived he gave Ben a look, but the two never exchanged words. They both _knew_ what had happened - it was strange how after it happened, the open communication about sex that they'd had seemed to disappear. Ben didn't really know what to say. He felt a little embarrassed because he knew he hadn't been some perfect lover to Adamma - not that he would admit that to anyone except himself - and he didn't feel like he could tell his father that. Not like Han would ask for details, but Ben didn't know that. This is when a feeling he'd previously had about his father developed a name - _inconsistency. _Ben didn't hate Han. In fact, he loved him. But he couldn't open up to him in the ways a son should be able to open up to a father because he never really knew what was going on in his dad's head, and he didn't know how to ask. He didn't want to ask.

So Ben traveled to Ahch To, no longer a virgin, to begin training with Luke. After his fall to the Dark Side, he'd entertained the occasional lover as the dark and mighty Kylo Ren. First Order women found him mysterious, and he needed the sex to clear his head. He was an attentive and gentle lover and this had surprised a few of the women, but he never let them say anything. Sometimes he'd chuckle at the irony, how he was kind of a walking compilation of the weakest parts of his father and none of the best of his mother - the thing he had been trying so desperately to avoid. Kylo Ren had never been in love, though. Kylo Ren couldn't really love. Ben was convinced of that. And he tried to convince himself that it didn't matter that Kylo Ren couldn't love because Kylo Ren didn't need anything, or anyone, but power.

Then Kylo Ren had met Rey, that impossibly infuriating scavenger girl.

His attraction to her was immediate and that frustrated him. In retrospect, he understood exactly why: she _looked_ and _acted_ like everything he had ever wanted in a partner. She was both physically strong and strong in the Force - at least as strong as him, and oftentimes stronger. It was simultaneously frustrating and fascinating how strong she was, and untrained! That boggled his mind more than anything. Her lack of training intimidated him for a moment, but then it simply drew him in. He was intrigued. He wanted to be a part of the journey she took to find herself. It wasn't just her strength that drew him in, though; oh no. She was also impossibly beautiful. The brown color of her hair haunted his dreams, and he loved the way it looked washed and resting on her shoulders as much as he loved how it would fall out of its buns as she threw her whole body into fighting him. _Her whole body._ The way her tight muscles moved underneath her arms and legs as she sparred with him turned him on just as much as the way her eyes shone with ferocity when she battled him or brightness when she thought she could turn him. Her lightly freckled skin, the thin lines of old scars, her tightly-bound-but- noticeable breasts, the arced twist of her hips, the coral bend of her lips… she haunted his dreams. She was his _everything._

And once they had discovered their bond, he had to be extra careful how much or in what context he thought of her. He stopped having sex with First Order women. He found his sexual release in the thought of her twisting on his bedsheets, crying out for him as his mouth explored her body, but he would blush right after he finished because she was _more_ than that. She wasn't just some outlet for his frustration, a strong female fantasy to get off on in private but undercut in public. If he really wanted _that_ then he could have found many a willing partner to use for his own pleasure, a woman willing to get drunk on her fill of whatever power or attention he felt like lavishing upon her. No, he felt something different for her and he had difficulty explaining it because he had never experienced it. And he _couldn't _experience it - he couldn't have her. She was training to be a Jedi, she was part of the Resistance, she had been successfully trained by his uncle and had adopted his mother to be as her own. He was Kylo Ren, and he had become Kylo Ren so that he would not be inconsistent. He could not be inconsistent. He would rather die than be inconsistent. So he suppressed that desire… that _love_? _Is this what love feels like?_ And he continued to fight and frustrate her. But once they discovered they were bonded through the Force somehow, he had to constantly police his thoughts and hide his feelings for her. He knew that if she found that foothold… if she knew she was his weakness…. Well, then she would realize just how easy it would be to get through to him. She was confident that she could, yes, but that confidence stemmed from naivete and hope and wasn't based on any real knowledge. The more atrocities he allowed, the more he committed to the First Order's cause, the longer he submitted to Snoke's training, the more consistent he would be and the more likely he would be to convince both her _and himself_ that Ben Solo was really gone. Rey's baseless confidence could be easily crushed and he knew it.

Easily crushed… easily crushed...

In the end, who was it who had been easily crushed?

As the X-wing made its way closer to Ahch To and Rey slept peacefully in his arms, Ben continued to reminisce. Love - which is exactly what this was, there was no other word for it, and he didn't need prior experience of it because he just _knew_ \- was strange to him. His mind began to wander, thinking about what his father had taught him about loving a woman. So much of it had been about the physical, sure… and those lessons had been important and helpful. But now Ben understood something about the emotional force behind what made his father say what he said and the _way _he said it. When his father had talked about loving a woman it was clear that he was an experienced _lover_, but it was also clear just how much he loved Leia in every way and that he had never loved another woman the way he loved her. He did not just want to know every inch of her body, he wanted to know every inch of _her_, period. Ben had never experienced that convergence of needs. He had loved the bodies of beautiful women and he'd like to think that he'd loved them well, but something about Rey woke him all the way up. Ben understood that nuance in his father's voice now that he knew Rey and could hold her and…

His reminiscing stopped as he stumbled across a thought that gave him pause. _What about her? What does she know of love… what has she known of love? _He suddenly felt incredibly nervous, insecure, and curious all at once. He knew it was hypocritical but he didn't like the thought of the possibility of someone else having touched her. He also didn't like the idea of being the first one to touch her, because he knew he still had a lot to atone for and she was one of the best beings existing in the galaxy. _I guess I'll have to be patient with her, see what she wants, _he decided. _I mean… she called me "dear Ben." But I don't know if I can, or if I should, read into that. Maybe she's just relieved to be alive and safe. Although… _he thought back to every time he sensed her nervousness around him, the way her heart would skip a beat, the way she would look at him… a look deeper than a look… he sighed and planted a soft kiss on the side of her head. She stirred slightly at this feather-light touch and in turn his own body began to stir. He concentrated. _Not now, not now. We have a LOT to discuss before I can let my body react to her, _he told himself. He chuckled to himself. _I may be strong with the Force, but there are some things a cold shower can help better than the flow of the Force._ Even the way older Jedi always seemed to talk about the Force (he guessed that at some point they got over how this surely sounded to them in their youth), their speeches about how it _penetrates _all of nature - he couldn't couple that explanation with his thoughts about himself and Rey Palpatine being a dyad in the Force, because those wires easily crossed and always came back to _Rey _and _penetrate. _

As the X-wing approached Ahch To and began to make a slow descent, Ben took a moment to quietly look out over the world - a world he'd never been to, the world his uncle had run to when he'd failed to successfully train him - but it struck him with a familiar, homelike feeling. He knew that Rey had also lived and trained here, but he felt a sudden urge to ask her to re-explore this place through his eyes. _And maybe have sex…_

He flinched a bit and knew he had gotten carried away with his thoughts and they had almost betrayed him. Rey began to wake, stirring and stretching as much as she could and rubbing her blurred eyes. She wiped a little trail of spittle from the corner of her mouth as she peered through the glass of the ship, looking down on the planet. "It feels like I was just here," she said softly, her voice husky and thick with sleep. It seemed to Ben that she gave no indication of somehow having sensed his thoughts, _thank God._

Ben placed one hand on the controls to manually land the ship and gently mussed her hair with his other hand. "How does it feel?"

Rey looked up at him and smiled, a tender, sleepy look in her eyes. "Mmmm, it feels nice." He looked at her quizzically and she realized that's not what he had meant. "Oh! You mean being back here. On the planet. Ahem." She cleared her throat and then laughed softly. "Well, I have to be honest… it's different. I've been here with you, but I've never _been here_ with you." Ben's mind flashed back to the first time they'd touched hands. For her, that had happened on this planet. He felt a little overwhelmed by the old emotions he associated with that memory and the new ones he because Rey had said that his playing with her hair _felt nice. _

As they landed, old memories began to wash over Ben the way the waves that crashed against the island swelled up on the shore. _I wonder what she's thinking about, _he pondered as their ship powered down. As the X-wing settled in the earth and Ben raised the cockpit canopy, Rey made an attempt to climb off of him, gingerly brushing past him as she moved, her muscles screaming with exhaustion. She climbed down to the base of the ship and raised an arm to help Ben if he needed it. _It's amazing how quickly your muscles can feel completely atrophied when you use them so much and then rest them for a couple of hours, _he mused as he struggled to clamber out of the ship. He gripped Rey's hand and the force of the contact threw her a little off-balance, but she gripped back tightly and helped him drag himself out of the cockpit.

Ben's boots landed on the spongy ground with a thud and his legs shook with the impact. Rey grasped his arm with an "Are you okay?" and he gave her an affirmative grunt. "I think so," he replied. "I think I'm just beginning to feel how tired I am right now."

The wind whipped Rey's face as she looked up from where they stood. She pushed a couple of unruly strands of hair away from her face and spotted Luke's old hut. "Ben, look!" She pointed at the hut, its stones battered by the angry gusts. Some of them would likely fall off and be left to the Caretakers for reapplication when the coming storm passed, but the hut still made for more reliable shelter than the X-wing or abandonment out in the open atmosphere of the planet. "Let's go here… it's your uncle's old place. It's where I found your mother's lightsaber. I'm sure there are some blankets and a place for you to rest, and we can plan our next move after that."

Ben nodded and Rey instinctually inserted herself under his arm, wrapping her own arm around his waist (or trying to - _I am so tall! _Ben thought), and helped him towards the small residence. As the two of them stumbled through the slippery grass, scattered families of porgs looking to find less exposed shelter from the coming storm paused to look at them, eyeing them questioningly and then turning back to their nests.

They crashed through the door right as the wind started to pick up, and both of them nearly fell on top of each other from the force of it. It finally struck Ben - _we're alone, there's a storm coming, we're alone _\- and he felt… nervous? Like he didn't want to somehow say or do the wrong thing, or not say or do the right thing? Kylo Ren would have never felt nervous to be alone with a woman like Rey. Kylo Ren was a dominant figure who exuded power and control at every opportunity. No one, let alone a woman, was Kylo Ren's weakness because Kylo Ren had no weaknesses. Kylo Ren was strong and consistent. But Ben Solo? Ben Solo could probably fall in love. Ben Solo could feel weak in the knees. Ben Solo's breath could be taken away by an unintentional touch (_from Rey_) and come completely undone at an intentional one (_from Rey_). Was now the time to let her know that, though?

She had kissed him on Exegol after he had revived her. What had that kiss been? Relief, joy, a need for comfort or closeness? Would she have kissed anyone who'd done what he did from sheer gratitude, for having been grasped back from death's clutches in the eleventh hour? He liked to think not, but he didn't want to try to read her mind in this instance. It didn't feel right. He wanted her to tell him, but the anticipation was killing him.

He watched Rey as she moved in the corner of the hut, dragging blankets out of an old hidden closet. She threw them onto the old wooden bed in the corner and arranged them delicately so that they completely covered the old scraggly mattress. She'd located a few old logs scattered about and added them to the few still in the fireplace and closed her eyes, concentrating, to light a fire with the Force. Ben's heart throbbed just watching her do these simple things, and throbbed doubly hard because he knew that she was doing them in large part to make him comfortable. His could feel his pulse pounding so loudly in his neck that he felt like he was going to be sick, or pass out, from his nervousness. He hoped she didn't notice.

As the fresh fire blazed, the hut began to slowly warm to a comfortable temperature. Rey tended the fire wordlessly, and Ben could feel himself thawing - his muscles lost their tension from the warmth, the blood and dust caked in his hair seemed to liquefy, and his heavy black clothes suddenly felt painfully oppressive. "Rey," he breathed, and she looked up at him with warm amber eyes softened by their proximity to the fire. He almost lost it right then and there.

"Yeah, Ben?"

He gulped, his voice coming out deeply husky. "Uh, I think I need to take my shirt off. This fire… it feels nice but it's making me so lightheaded." Without a word she got up and walked over to him (all of the seven feet that stood between them) and grasped his forearms. It was clear that she had moved before she'd thought about what she was doing, because when she stood in front of him she once again averted her eyes from his gaze in what he perceived to be shyness. Without looking up into his deep dark eyes, she said "Do you need h-help taking it off? I know your arms probably feel stiff."

Ben swallowed, knowing her suggestion was practical but trying to hide how excitable it also was. "Sure."

As Rey moved to grasp the bottom of his shirt and lift it up, she brushed against the bare skin of his side. Ben involuntarily hissed and she froze. "Does that hurt?" She questioned him, concerned. He shook his head and she continued to gently pull up his shirt, being careful not to rip open any scars or scabs. Ben had forgotten about how many wounds tattooed his body and felt a sudden rush of insecurity, but then he remembered that those old wounds had been healed when Rey filled him with her life Force on Kef Bir. _Anyway, she knows,_ he thought to himself. _Even if they had still been there, she knows. I don't think scars are a problem for her… I'm sure she has plenty of her own._

"Kneel down," she said tenderly. "I can't lift this off you at your full height." She giggled at that, and he grinned and immediately obeyed. Even as he knelt he still nearly met her at eye level. She pulled his arms through his sleeves and lifted the black pullover above his head, taking it off. As he looked at her, biting her lip in concentration as she gently maneuvered his shirt, he didn't know if he could survive the night without somehow physically showing her how much he loved her. He had to do something about it.

**V. Confessions**

Ben's chest heaved, glistening with sweat, and Rey felt that familiar rush in her body intensified by ten. It was like all the blood in her body had suddenly surged to her core, throbbingly painful _but she liked it_, and she felt it flowing like a powerfully thick, all-consuming liquid. Her cheeks blanched as she crumpled up his shirt and threw it to the side. He was looking up at her, on his knees but still practically at her eye level, and she felt herself overcome with nerves. _I can be confident when facing off against my grandfather, the most powerful Sith lord who ever lived, _she thought, her heart racing, _I fought Kylo Ren multiple times. I co-piloted with Han Solo, with no training, multiple times. I was trained as a Jedi by Luke and Leia… but I completely lose my cool when I'm alone with Ben Solo and I'm presented with the possibility of physically showing him how I really feel. _She was glad she'd kissed him when she'd awoken from her brief death - it had been impulsive, but it had been real. But she didn't know how to initiate any of this. She was terrified. She had never been touched intimately by anyone but herself, she had never been naked in front of anyone in a sexual context, and she had made love to Ben in her dreams but in real life? She knew what that entailed, but getting past the shackles of fear in her mind and _getting there_ was the issue. She was so overtaken by the combination of nerves and arousal that she thought she was going to burst if she didn't do something about it.

Ben must have sensed something, must have picked up on her inner conflict, because after she threw his shirt to the side he glanced up at her and in an instant was crushing his lips against hers. _We're one and one now, _she thought to herself, thinking of how she had initiated the first kiss they had shared and by all rights it was his turn to take the leap. His lips were soft and warm and without thinking about it she slid her tongue into his mouth like it was the most natural thing in the world. She slipped her tongue over his as he reached for her hips and grasped them without pausing, like it was an instinct. She felt her arms hang at her sides, unsure of where to position them as they kissed, knowing there must be a natural place for them to go but so unpracticed that it wasn't muscle memory yet. In what felt like a lifetime to her she slowly brought them up and moved them into his hair, and as she began to move her fingers through his black tresses she could tell that he liked it and felt him deepen the kiss. Without even thinking about it she sighed into his mouth, and at this he grasped her face and got off his knees and moved up with her body. Their lips broke apart with a smack as they stood upright, and Ben grasped Rey's face as her hands moved from his hair down the sides of his arms to settle on his biceps. He shivered, and she forced herself to look into his eyes, her breathing shallow as she tried to catch herself. She felt like that liquid sensation in her core was moving down and manifesting itself between her legs, pooling in a way that was simultaneously familiar and new.

"Rey," Ben breathed, also trying to catch his breath, his bare chest heaving. "I… can I? Can I touch you..."

"I'm a virgin," Rey blurted out, breaking physical contact with him. She walked over to the fire, wringing her hands nervously. Ben followed her with his eyes, watching her with delicate attention as she tried to get the words out. "Ben, I… Can I tell you something, something that's a little bit silly?" Her breathing had calmed down and her confidence was clearly growing, as she looked him in the eye when she made her request. As Ben walked towards her, she saw the tenderness reflected in his dark eyes (as well as the flames - _seems fitting_, she thought).

"Of course," Ben said softly. "You can tell me anything. I'm sure it's not silly."

"Okay," Rey laughed a little, nervous, flashing him a full-toothed smile. She walked towards Luke's bed and sat down, gesturing for Ben to follow her. He did so.

She turned towards him, looking into his eyes, and fully grasped his hands with hers. In her apprehensiveness she began twisting and massaging his fingers, and unbeknownst to her this casual contact and her sudden vulnerability really aroused him. She took a deep breath and began to speak. "Okay," she sighed. "Here it goes. So…"

"So, I'm a virgin. Never really had much time or experience with," she gestured vaguely, "all of this. I mean, when you're a female scavenger it's a pretty lonely life if you want to be safe and stay alive, which I obviously did." She chuckled here, absent-mindedly stroking a freckle on his thumb. "You can't trust anybody and you certainly can't trust anybody who might want to get you naked, exposed, overpower you. Sometimes things got _hard_," she said softly, immediately regretting her choice of words as Ben gulped. "I mean, it's not like I never thought about it or never wanted it. Especially from a practical standpoint because you get paid well and are cared for working in a pleasure house, even in a place like _Jakku._" Here she paused. "It's not even… it's not even like I'm so opposed to that life, and I know I could have used the money or the food at any point. But I was waiting for my family. I think that's what held me back, and I think I just had this idea that if I was their child somehow then they'd come back and take me. I didn't _want_ to leave Jakku. I wanted to go back. If it hadn't been for your father, and Maz Kanata, and Finn… I'd probably be there now, back in my buns, waiting for them." She looked up at him and gave him a gentle smile, running her fingers through hair which now fell completely loose on her shoulders. Ben's melancholy eyes pierced her, and he couldn't hide his sadness at her loneliness even though she was remembering it.

"Anyway, that's not even the thing I wanted to tell you," she continued. "So, during my time on Jakku I wasn't just a lonely child. It's not like I wasn't… _taking care of myself_, I suppose," she chuckled. "Sometimes to relax before bed I'd… touch myself. And I had this recurring image in my mind as I did it and I didn't know what it was, really. Come to think of it maybe it was some projection of the Force because it was very vivid. But anyway," _she stroked his fingers faster and faster, her nerves picking up again, her brain unsure how her tongue would form the words she wanted to say, _"There was this man who was loving my body, and I don't know how to explain it - again, I never knew this was anything really _real _\- but I know now that that man was you. And he loved my body every night that I touched myself, which was most nights. And I figured he was some creation of my brain, some strange lonely fantasy, perhaps the face of a handsome stranger I'd seen at the trading post and stored away in my mind's eye… but then when you interrogated me and you took off your mask I couldn't believe it because I realized it was you and you were real."

Ben's eyes grew wide with surprise at her admission, but it was a _good_ and _relieved_ surprise, and he couldn't help the smile that crept across his face. Rey breathed a heavy sigh of relief when she saw his reaction, and this gave her new confidence. "It was _always_ you," she whispered. "I … I think it was the Force that gave me those thoughts, those _fantasies_, that gave me a sense of our… our _dyad_ before I even realized I was special. I mean, before I realized that I could do things and that the Force flowed through me and made me able to do them. And I think it was that thought, that _feeling_, that memory, really… that was what made me so certain that you could be turned. Because it was Ben Solo whom I'd loved, with _this_ body, my woman's body with my hair down. And I just knew that he wasn't really dead because I didn't let my hair down until Kylo Ren was running around the galaxy and Ben Solo was allegedly dead for good," she chuckled. She paused and looked at him, and it was less than a second before Ben's lips were on her lips yet again and _he_ was sighing into her mouth, overwhelmed by the intimacy of her confession. She reached out and grasped his arms just like she had for years in her fantasies, and laid down on the bed as she pulled him flush against her body.

He peppered kisses on her lips and she moaned softly as he began to move to the corners of her mouth, down her jaw, up her jawline towards her ear, sucking on her earlobe as he whispered "It was always you for me, too." He sent chills down her body as he continued to kiss everywhere on her perfect face. He planted soft kisses on the freckles that speckled her nose and cheeks, he moved along her other jawline to her other ear, and there he whispered "And it always will be." She wriggled underneath him, giving into the pleasure of his touch but consumed by her own nervousness and preoccupied with her need to shed some of her own clothes and touch him skin-to-skin.

"Ben," she sighed. "Ben," (_panting_) "this feels incredible," (_panting_) "but I need to take something off, or I'm going to die." Ben pulled her up gently and stroked the front of her shirt and Rey felt like her heart was going to constrict and burst.

"Here. Let me help you. You helped me, after all, and fair is fair," he cocked an eyebrow at her, grinning, and Rey recognized that smirk. It was a very Solo smirk.

Rey laughed nervously as he moved in, and Ben certainly took his time shedding her clothes. He ran his finger along her arm, tracing every freckle and scar, and started with her arm bands. First one, then the other, planting a kiss on each new patch of exposed skin. Then he moved to her belt, removing it so that he could better access both her shirt and her pants. His hands were big but surprisingly lithe as they removed her clothing and his deft and expertful motions made it immediately clear to Rey that he had done this before, which caused her nervousness to flare up again. In their current connected state, Ben could feel her fear and he paused just before sliding the thick strap of her shirt off her shoulders.

"Shhh, hey," he said tenderly, "Rey. Look at me." His deep voice sounded… _deeper_? Thick with love and lust and that unique understanding that belonged to _them_ as a dyad. Rey looked at him, her chest heaving and her nipples pressing through the material of her shirt.

"I've done this before," Ben sighed. "As Han Solo's son, there was a bit of an expectation there." Here he paused, chuckled, took a deep breath, and started again. "And I can't honestly say I regret it, but I can also honestly say that I'm nervous too, Rey. I'm nervous because I have never _loved_ anyone before. And… and I _love_ you, Rey, and I want you to be comfortable and I want to do right by you. So I also haven't done this before… from a certain point of view." Here she met his gaze, and her fear dissipated into an urgent desire for intimacy with this beautifully brilliant boy. _He loves me? He loves… nobody has ever loved me before. Well, now I've had friends, and they LOVE me, but nobody has ever loved me like this and wanted to love me like this and I…_

Rey smiled the way she had smiled when she'd awoken from death on Exegol, full of wonderment and love and desire. A new darkness crept into her eyes, pure lust, and for a brief moment she was thrown back to how it felt when, on this very same planet, she had touched hands with Ben Solo for the first time. She was experiencing that same base feeling again but it was multiplied by so much: sure love, Ben's redemption, their shared fights and traumas, their mutual physical desire… it was too much for her not to act on it. The time was right. As the storm began to crash outside their hut, Rey met Ben's steady gaze with her heavy-lidded eyes and softly purred, "Then be with me, Ben Solo."

**VI. "Then be with me, Ben Solo."**

When Rey said those words - "Then be with me, Ben Solo" - he leapt into action like he had been waiting to hear those words his entire life. Careful to be gentle with her because it was still her first time and he had no intention of crushing her under the strength of his physical body or his desire, he teased her sleeve off her right shoulder and kissed it, sucking on the skin to mark it, then peppered kisses along her collarbone to the other shoulder and repeated the same. Rey sighed, feeling his energy pulse through her body with every touch, and even more desperate to remove what barriers of clothing were left between them. "Ben, my shirt," she gasped. "P-please just - _ohhhh,_" (here he planted another kiss right at the base of her neck and caught her off guard) "P-please just take the whole thing off. I need to feel my skin… (another gasp) I need to feel _your_ skin on mine."

Obeying her orders, he tugged on her shirt and freed it from where it had been tucked in. He slowly lifted it over her head bit by bit, exposing her taut, tanned skin and plentiful gooseflesh. As he exposed her breasts it took everything in him not to immediately lavish all of his kisses on them, small and perfect as they were. As he pulled her shirt over her head, she shook it and her hair settled lightly just below her shoulders. The way she smirked at him with her hair freed like that made him feel like he'd been punched in the gut. Her raw beauty was overwhelming. He took a moment to sit back and admire her and he took _everything_ in, from the veins carrying the blue blood that pulsed through her breasts to her erect dusty pink nipples to every freckle and scar that dotted her chest and … it was too much. He gave her a look as if to say _Is this okay?_ And Rey closed her eyes, sighing, giving her consent through their bond. _Ben… touch me. _

Ben leaned in and took her right nipple into his mouth, overwhelmed by the feeling of sucking her tight, intimate skin while she writhed under his touch. He gently laid her down on the bed again and after showering her right nipple with attention he moved to her left and repeated his actions, interspersing soft kisses on the cleavage between her breasts as he moved. As he kissed her in a rhythm and his body contorted over hers, every brush of his bare skin against hers gave her a flash of deep pleasure in her core. In a way that touch and the overwhelming personal intimacy of it aroused her more than the way he lavished her breasts. "More, _more_," she whimpered. And as Ben's face remained buried between her breasts, his hand crept down the front of her pants to settle on her vulva and he began stroking her delicately. His large thumb fumbled around, his nervousness getting the better of him, as he was determined to find her clit. _No one else has ever done this for her except her, _he couldn't help but think, _and I know her better than anyone else besides her. I *need* to do this for her._

Rey sat up suddenly, which gave Ben pause. "No," she panted, "dear Ben, sweet Ben, listen to me. I can show you how to do _that_…" - her eyes briefly dipped down to her groin and his eyes grew wide at her generous offer - "But when I said _more_, I meant I wanted to feel more of you on me. You can - you can take off your pants, if you'd like. A-and mine, too," she finished quickly.

"Are you sure?"

"Yes. I'm sure."

Ben climbed off the bed and began unbuckling his pants, blushing a little and averting his eyes from Rey, who was curiously intent on him. _I remember when she was too embarrassed to see me shirtless, _he mused. _I heard that! _He heard her voice in his head, and then looked at her, shaking her head at him, a playful smile on her lips. As Ben twisted out of his pants, Rey got her first glimpse at his thighs, thick with muscle, and the coarse black hair that covered his legs. There were minimal gashes and scars along those legs, which surprised her, but then she remembered that he had only been accumulating them since she'd last healed him. Soon Ben was left in nothing but his undergarments and she raised an eyebrow at him. A bit shy to say it out loud, she used their bond to tell him what she wanted.

_All of it, Ben._

He obliged her, stepping out of his undergarments to stand before her completely naked. His pubic hair was as black as the rest of his hair although his chest was shaved; and even though Rey had never laid eyes on a penis in a sexual situation before, she felt like his penis was fittingly proportionate to the rest of his body. It was large because _he_ was large, but the sight of it did not frighten her the way she thought it might before. It fascinated her.

As he stood in front of her, watching her chest heave and her interested eyes take in his body, he could feel his penis begin to curve up and stiffen with arousal. That thrill that rushed through _his_ core - the pooling blood and his liquefied feelings, well, it was quite obvious where it found its home. Rey cocked her head and he could plainly see her slight blush and her overwhelming curiosity. Before he could say anything, such as _Please Rey, say something_, she said something.

"Come here, Ben." That sounded like a command. That sounded like Rey's confidence was flourishing.

Ben walked towards her, obviously full of his own need and desire for her. She stood up and faced him, standing directly in front of him. "Now take _my_ pants off," she said, desperately trying to hold her voice steady but unable to mask the slight nervous quaver in it. Her belt was already gone, so this part was easy for him. He reached over and brushed the waistline of her pants, gripping the sides and slowly sliding her pant legs down her body. They were tight, so she had to twist a little to get out of them and almost fell right into his arms - but they came off. Next came her undergarments, which had once been white but were clearly dusted with some remaining ash from her recent travels. She suddenly became self-conscious when she realized that, but Ben sensed her thoughts and stopped them in their tracks. _You're perfect. Stop worrying._

As the two of them stood before each other completely naked, they reached out and touched hands like they had in that projection - that seemed so long ago! As they did, thunder cracked outside their hut and the rain really began to pour - just like it had on that night. They began to laugh together. It seemed fitting.

Rey gained a sudden confidence - very sudden considering her minimal history of interpersonal nakedness - and looked Ben in the eyes as she pushed him back onto the bed. She crawled down his body, kissing him as she went, her breasts brushing his chest as she moved (_causing everything within him to flush and constrict_), until she settled just above his penis and paused, looking at it intently. She did not break his gaze, and Ben eyed her nervously. _Please, Rey, _he begged. _You have to be gentle or I won't last, and I would really like to last... _

Rey smiled, hearing his pleas in her head, and ran a calloused finger tentatively over the shaft of his penis. Ben sucked in a breath and exhaled with a shaky sigh. He had been touched this way before - many times, by himself and by others - but _her _fingers felt different. Her fingers were precise and gentle, like a successful scavenger's fingers would need to be, but they had a firm and grounded grasp that was more than that. Being touched by her was almost like the first time - well, it was (_from a certain point of view_), wasn't it? - and he closed his eyes (_mmmmm, Rey_), gasping for her as he pressed back against the mattress. Rey hoped she wasn't being too clumsy and she took care to be very gentle, caressing him with nimble fingers and occasionally feeling him twitch in her hand. She absent-mindedly stroked his black pubic hairs, causing gooseflesh to form all around his balls and thighs. As she gained familiarity and confidence touching his body, she moved down to kiss him and pressed softly with her lips on the tip of his penis, rolling his foreskin back and forth in her hands before taking his whole head in her mouth. She didn't quite realize the power she had - didn't know how to time her ministrations - and she _knew_ what happened when men achieved sexual release, of course she did, but she was too inexperienced to read the signs that Ben was much closer to that than she (or either of them, quite frankly) expected. In what felt like a very sudden instant he thrust forward powerfully into her mouth and filled it, and Rey's head shot back from the force of it. She swallowed most of his cum from pure reflex, and coughed up the rest from the impact. Ben sat up quickly and grasped her body, grabbing onto her biceps, humiliated.

"Rey... Rey, I'm so sorry." His full voice seemed to become fuller with remorse and shame, and he truly couldn't believe what had happened. Rey coughed again, took a deep breath, and looked up at him.

"Ben, Ben - hey - I'm fine. Don't be embarrassed." She reached over and caressed his face, stroking his cheek with her thumb like she had done before kissing him on Exegol, and he leaned over and wiped salty residue from the corner of her mouth. "I'm going to spend so much time getting to know your body, and I will know it _so _well, that at some point we'll look back and laugh at this. Truly, Ben." She smiled despite her nervousness and the discomfort of what had happened - because it _had_ been forceful, and it _had_ taken her by surprise - but she meant every word that she said to Ben. He seemed to relax at this and lay back on the bed, his penis lying flaccid between his legs and his eyes darting between focusing on her eyes and contemplating some very interesting spot on the wall. Finally, he cleared his throat and began to speak, although he did not make eye contact with her.

"Rey…" he trailed off. "I, uh - that's not how I wanted to, um, finish. With you. I feel like I've spoiled things."

Rey laughed lightly at this. "Oh, but you haven't," she insisted, reaching out and grasping his cheeks so that he was forced to look at her. "Ben... you've still got fingers, haven't you?" She cocked an eyebrow at him and her voice lilted a bit at the _haven't you?_ And Ben's head snapped up in an instant because _not only did he have fingers_ but he _sure knew how to use them, too_. He smiled lightly and thought _This will be my redemption, then _and Rey read this thoughts and teased him with an _okay then, get to it, Ben Solo_ and with that he was up like a shot, grasping her by the arms and flipping her over so that they changed positions on the bed. The force and momentum of his excitement struck Rey as so funny and she laughed and cried out "Ben! Ben! You're going to kill me! Be gentle!" as he affectionately nuzzled the nape of her neck and straddled her torso, careful not to crush her under his weight. He waited for her laughter to subside before he looked her in the eyes and took a pause, a breath. As he looked at her Rey realized _Oh, this is really about to happen_ and felt her face flush, but she was confident. Ben cleared his throat and absentmindedly brushed a finger across her collarbone. Rey sighed and pushed her body back into the mattress.

"Rey," he began, his baritone voice exuding its sultry, nonchalant confidence once again. "I would like you to show me how you usually do this so that I know where to start… don't be afraid."

Rey's cheeks flushed as she moved her left hand down her body to her vulva and slipped a finger inside herself, lightly stroking her labia and teasing her vaginal opening with adept, practiced fingers. She felt her damp arousal growing and it pressed her forward, freshly desperate for some release. It felt a bit strange to be doing this in front of Ben, _under _Ben, but the part of her that felt odd about it was being completely sacrificed to how good it felt. Ben studied her motions and looked at her as if to say _Can I…?_ And she nodded, eyes closed, still focused. He traced her arm with his fingers until those fingers met hers inside of her, and he grasped onto them and used them to trace the same motions she had been making. He pressed down on her labia, alternating this tension with brushes against her clit just above, as she squirmed and raised her hips to meet him. Rey clasped his wrist as he pressed harder and his strokes grew faster, _desperate_ to orgasm from his touch. "Ben, press _more_," she moaned. "Right there, no, no, _right there_," she gasped as she pushed harder on his wrist, reinforcing his motion inside of her. Ben could feel his fingers cramping, and it had been minutes already. _Don't stop, I'm close,_ he heard Rey's voice in his head and he kept going. Without removing his fingers from inside her body he reached forward, pressed a kiss to her sweaty temple, and then leaned down so that his face met her navel. He moved down, down, _down_ until his nose brushed the coarse hairs on her vulva. He then parted the folds of her vulva with his lips, offering one final thrust with his fingers before he replaced them with his tongue. _Ughhhhhhhhhhhmmmmmmmm, _Rey cried out, overcome with pleasure, her heart accelerating as her body became acquainted with this new intimate touch. Ben used his tongue _and_ his teeth, sucking and kissing and claiming every inch of her, and Rey felt like every part of her body below her rapidly beating heart was simultaneously melting and bursting into flames. She sat up a little, stomach taut and twisting, to plunge her hands into Ben's hair. She rocked with him, grasping his temples like a lifeline, as a powerful orgasm crashed over her. She came as a powerful thunderclap boomed outside and collapsed on the bed, writhing, exhausted, sated.

Ben could _feel _when her muscles contracted around his tongue and to know that that powerful pulsing was the first orgasm Rey had ever received at another's hand gave him a new energy. His penis slowly began to rouse itself, his brain so saturated by the image of Rey before him gasping out her release, her face red and sweaty, her toes curling and her limbs twitching. He felt powerful, but it was unlike any other power he had ever known in his life. Suddenly he remembered all those things his father had said, _years_ ago, about loving a woman. It took everything in him not to burst into tears at the thought - it was overwhelming, how much he loved Rey and how incredible it felt to _show_ her that love, to thrill her body and whisper tender things in her ear. It was a far cry from the words he'd spoken to her while Kylo Ren possessed Ben Solo's body. It wasn't until Rey had opened her eyes, her chest still heaving, and asked "Ben?" hesitantly that he realized that he'd been away with his thoughts and had unconsciously blocked her out of them.

She leaned up against the headboard, propped up on her elbows, and giggled softly. "Ben, I… _thank you._" She blushed as he smiled at her thanks, and she followed up with an _I have a feeling that you'll get to know my body just fine, and I don't need the Force to sense that_, and Ben smiled even wider. "Perhaps one of these days I'll get you there in under ten minutes," he said suggestively, a stupid grin plastered on his face that not even her feigned dissapointed gasp could shake. "Now, now, Ben Solo," she snorted, "I am the last Jedi. I am a hero, and a goddess…" She paused here, thinking, "Oh! And in case nobody mentioned it, I am _the_ best scavenger in all of Jakku. I am a _very _complex woman with _very _complex needs… you will take as long as I need you to," she whispered, crawling towards him once again, "and you will take me there _Every. Single. Time._" Ben gulped, his penis straining, rising to meet her as she closed the gap between their bodies. Rey blushed lightly, looked down at his penis, then up into his eyes again. "I can see you've, uh, recovered."

"Yes," Ben gasped weakly, completely overwhelmed by how relaxed and intoxicatingly confident she was. Her pink nipples were straining and her eyes were on fire. The strands of her hair that were not stuck to her sweaty face, neck, or back were messily framing her face. It was cliche, sure, but she was imperfectly perfect. Her body, sated and sensitive, was ready to feel all of him if his was ready to feel all of her.

"Alright, Ben Solo," she smiled, sitting up and positioning herself in front of him the way she had on Exegol before they kissed, ready to clasp him close to her at a moment's notice. "You told me you wanted to show me just what you think of me. What _is_ that, exactly?"

Ben's eyes went black, his pupils dilated with thick lust. "I find you infuriating, scavenger," he choked out. His chest rose and fell surprisingly steadily, his pectorals gleaming with sweat. "You threw off all my plans. If I couldn't be consistently good, I would be consistently evil. At least I'd be consistent. I wouldn't love so I wouldn't lose as foolishly as my father did, or hurt anyone like he hurt my mother," he breathed. "But you… you made that impossible. Somehow you became _everything_ to me. You understand me, Rey. I have never loved anyone. I thought I had closed myself off from that entirely. But you… somehow you found your way in, and I have no way to fully express how happy it makes me that you did." He paused and slowly raised his right hand, splaying his fingers across her chest to feel her heartbeat. Her blood pumped faster at his touch and her breathing became shallow. "I love you, Rey. And if it's alright -"

Rey cut in here, a wave of confidence crashing over her. "I love you, Ben," she interjected. "_Be with me. _Please, be with me."

That was all it took. Wordlessly, mirroring the way she had first lunged at him on Exegol, Ben leaned forward and closed the distance between them with a kiss. He devoured her lips like a starving man, pulling her in close, exploring every stretch of her body with his large hands, finally settling on the small of her back as he pressed down gently on the bottom of her spine. She reciprocated his desperate kisses, her hands in his hair, moving down to dust a feather-light touch on his stubbled jawline, bold and frantic and painfully aware of how much of this body there was left to explore and suddenly needing to explore it all in great depth right then and there. Rey flipped Ben onto his back and straddled his hips, grinding her body against him as she continued kissing him. Ben could feel her arousal wet against his belly, he could feel her pelvic muscles contracting, and he grasped her arms as he gently but firmly flipped them back over so that Rey was under him once again. He wasn't aware of anything at this very moment except for his desperate need to be inside her, to _feel all of her. _He paused for a moment, looked down at her, and grunted out his question. "Rey?"

"Mmmmm," she replied, knowing what he wanted to ask before he had a chance to ask and desperately needed what it was he wanted to do. "Yes, Ben. _Be with me, be with me, be with me,_" she sighed, like a mantra. "It has always been you (_sigh_), I need you (_gasp_), I love you."

Ben gulped and guided his penis towards her vaginal opening, disbelieving for a second that this moment was _real _and that he loved Rey and she loved him back and this was _happening. _He slid into her, inch by inch, and she cried out at the feeling. She adjusted her body as she rose to meet him, thrilled at the sensation of feeling him inside her. _This does not feel foreign to me_, she mused. Ben, on the other hand, felt completely overwhelmed at the feeling of being enveloped by her. He nearly forgot to move, he was paralyzed and completely in awe of how even though this was their first time doing this _it certainly feels like I've been making love to her for my whole life? _Shocked back to his senses, he began to move inside of her, slowly, slowly, slowly, picking up the pace as she wrapped her legs around his hips and boosted her body upwards, desperate to feel him in the deepest part of her core. All of her movements were instincts and all of his were habits that had each taken on an entirely new meaning when confronted with her: impossible, aggravating, exasperating, and _absolutely perfect _as she was. His thrusts became more frantic, her cries became more strangled, and the storm outside had clearly reached some sort of climax and was on the cusp of subsiding. Their silhouettes cast on the wall, conceived by the firelight, looked just like the shadows from Rey's ancient fantasies, those prophecies that foretold the carnal union of this dyad before they ever knew each other. As they moved together, sighed together, sweated together, Ben could feel the irrepressible tightness in his balls and he knew that he wouldn't last much longer. "Rey," he gasped, reaching for her, pulling her closer, kissing her, hiding her within his body, "Rey…" He came with a burst and filled her completely, exhaling sharply as he collapsed on top of her. Rey, still riding his high and inflamed at the feeling of his semen inside of her, slid her left hand between their bodies and back down to her labia and clit, alternating hard presses _once, twice, three times_ until she was riding the same euphoric wave that he was. After she came, she curled into Ben's chest, whimpering softly as she lightly traced his skin with her fingers. As their heart rates slowed down, Ben pressed a soft kiss to her left temple. They could hear the storm outside subsiding as what had been booming, heavy rains trickled into soft pattering on the roof of the hut. The fire still blazed hotly and the glow from it reflected off their faces, still sticky with perspiration.

Ben shifted to look at Rey as she absentmindedly traced figure eights in the crook of his right arm. "Rey?"

"Mmmm?" She said softly, her head buzzing, drunk off their closeness and taking inventory of the dark hair and freckles that speckled his arm.

"Are we -" he paused here, sighing, searching for the right word. He knew that Rey was understanding and unlikely to misinterpret whatever he said too badly, but he also wanted to find the right words to express what he felt. "Are we, you know, _good_? This thing between us - whatever it is - is it what you want?"

Rey curled over and looked up at him, her caramel colored eyes flashing with affection. "Ben," she said, and when she said his name her voice dripped with such tenderness that he felt like his heart was going to burst. Everything inside his chest felt sticky and warm and constricted and all of it was drawn right to her. "My Ben, we are more than _good._ I-" here _she_ paused, searching for her own words. "I never expected you. I never expected any of this. But I can tell you _this_ much, and that is I know myself pretty well. I know my feelings well. And the feeling that I am _most_ sure about - have always been most sure about - is that Ben Solo _exists, _Ben Solo is a _good man, _Ben Solo is an _honorable man_, and Ben Solo is _mine._" She grasped his hand, drawing it to her lips, kissing it softly. Chills ran through what felt like every part of Ben's body as he drew her in, hugging her naked chest close to his naked chest, and began to sob softly into her hair.

"Thank you for loving Ben Solo, even when he forgot himself," he whispered into her hair's parting. "I wish - my biggest regret is it taking this long for me to find myself, to know that loving you and fighting alongside you is the consistency _and _courage I've always looked for. My parents loved you and I think if they knew the man I was desperately trying to be - I know I'm not worthy of you, Rey - but I'm trying to be and I think that if they knew the man I was trying to be, then they would have loved you for-" Rey cut him off here, placing a compassionate finger on his lips.

"Ben," she said. "The evils that Kylo Ren carried out will be fully atoned for in time. The galaxy is rebuilding. The man Ben Solo, who was tortured by _my grandfather_ and experienced so much pain and conflict but still never fully lost himself, who still hung onto hope even when he fought so hard to suppress it… the man who _saved my life_ on multiple occasions, who told me the truth whenever he knew it, who connected with me at my loneliest and understood me… Ben Solo is a broken man in many ways but not any more broken than the rest of us. Ben Solo, you have been redeemed, just as your grandfather was redeemed," she finished tenderly. She laughed suddenly and said, "And if we're comparing _grandfathers _here, well...I don't even think I have to finish that thought." He playfully punched her arm and then kissed her forehead, and she kissed his upper lip and moved to the bridge of his nose. "Ben, I _love _you," Rey whispered softly. She grasped his hands, fully intertwining their fingers like they had both so desperately wanted the first time they had ever projected to each other and touched hands, right on this very planet, almost on this very spot… "I love you as the scavenger girl. I love you as the reluctant runaway. I love you as your uncle's apprentice. I love you as your mother's Padawan. I love you as the last Jedi. I love you as every incarnation of myself, and I love that you have _seen _every single one. Be with me forever, Ben. Let this be the start of forever."

Ben nodded and _I will, I will, I will. I'll love you forever, Rey _projected into her mind as she quietly slid out from beside him to use the toilet before settling in beside him for the night. While she was gone, Ben contemplated those lessons from his father yet again, thinking about Rey and her body and her mind and her strength and everything about her that he already loved so dearly and wanted to know even better. As these thoughts spun through his head and Rey, wrapped in a coarse Bantha fur blanket, slumped down next to him in bed again, Ben finally forgave his father and came to a new understanding of him. _It turns out I'm just like you, dad, _he mused, as Rey leaned over to kiss the ironic grin plastered on his face. _But it turns out being inconsistent to what you thought you wanted can bring you the greatest gift you never knew you wanted or needed. And mom, _he thought. _I'm like you, too. I've always been like you. But now that I know the strength that comes from love… I understand why you did what you did._

As Rey snuggled into Ben's side he piled the blankets on top of them, crushing and hiding them from the rest of the world. As far as he was concerned, they were the only two people in the galaxy. He couldn't believe how lucky he was. And as Rey slowly drifted into a dreamless sleep in the arms of the man she loved, the smell of sex and sweat and rain surrounding them, she _knew_ that her childhood was finally over. Even though the beginning of her life had been marked by her connectionless abandonment, she could heal, too. Just like Ben.

_Hope is the wildest, most beautiful thing._


End file.
